India enters next phase of governance transformation with AI-driven reforms: MoS

New Delhi, July 13 (IANS) Union MoS for Science & Technology, Earth Sciences, Dr. Jitendra Singh said India is entering the next phase of governance transformation through Next Generation Administrative and e‐Governance Reforms with AI, digital platforms at core, an official statement said on Monday. Dr. Singh inaugurated the two‐day National Conference on Next Generation Administrative and e‐Governance Reforms in Shillong, jointly organised by the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) and the Government of Meghalaya. The minister highlighted a decade of path-breaking administrative reforms and the removal of nearly 2,000 obsolete rules, adding that future reforms must integrate artificial I intelligence, cybersecurity, digital public infrastructure and citizen-centric service platforms. He said more than 56 crore Jan Dhan accounts, Aadhaar-enabled service delivery, Direct Benefit Transfer and the Unified Payments Interface have fundamentally changed the relationship between citizens and the government. UPI today processes over 18 billion transactions every month, making India a global leader in digital payments. Government has steadily moved from regulation to facilitation while placing citizens at the centre of policy making and public service delivery, he noted. The minister said the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances has transformed the Centralised Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) into one of the world's largest technology-enabled grievance platforms. Annual grievances have increased from around 2 lakh in 2014 to nearly 25 lakh today. He said the platform is now supported by artificial intelligence through multilingual chatbot services while retaining a human interface at the final stage of grievance disposal to ensure both efficiency and empathy. The minister also highlighted the nationwide Special Campaign for Disposal of Pending Matters and Cleanliness, that has generated over Rs 4,000 crores through scientific disposal of scrap and obsolete materials while freeing nearly 700 lakh square feet of office space. --IANS pk